


The Hopes and Fears of all the Years

by AddyPlantagenet



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: 2019 Jonerys Secret Santa, F/M, Jon Snow is a Stark, Jon Snow is a Targaryen, Jonerys Secret Santa, Targlings (ASoIaF)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-25
Updated: 2019-12-25
Packaged: 2021-02-17 23:24:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,389
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21951379
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AddyPlantagenet/pseuds/AddyPlantagenet
Summary: This is my addition for 2019 Jonerys Secret Santa.Jon and Daenerys cope with the possibility of pending parenthood.
Relationships: Jon Snow & Daenerys Targaryen
Comments: 7
Kudos: 33





	The Hopes and Fears of all the Years

When the Maester leaves, Daenerys stays seated by the window, her heart thundering in her chest. She feels almost ill. Something is lodged in her throat; bile, laughter or a scream, and it is all she can do to stay still and silent. She takes one breath and then another past her burning, constricted throat and presses a trembling hand against her stomach.  
She had prayed for this. Every time Jon had lain with her, every time he was inside her, every time she’d woken to his beautiful face, every time she’d seen him train or interact with his sisters, every time he’d made a decree or choice with that humane logic and that vast indomitable heart, she’d begged for the chance to have his child. The chance to have more of him. The chance to give him something that she knew he wanted as much as she did. Something that he’d never believed he’d have in his wildest dreams. In her bones she knew that there was no man more deserving of fatherhood, just as she knew that there was no way she’d convince him to take another wife, a woman who could at the very least give him children. Her Northern Wolf was loyal to a fault.  
Now the Maester had left after giving her news that filled her with so much hope it was almost painful. She wanted to run to Jon and reveal the good news. She wanted to see those dragon glass eyes light up with joy and excitement at their own personal miracle. But what if the Maester was mistaken? What if she lost the babe? Would he leave then? Could she bare the disappointment if her body failed them both? What if the true curse of the witch was a lifetime of perpetual hope with no reward? But didn’t he deserve to know he’d fathered a child, even if that child died? Best to wait then… best to be certain.  
She could see his face struggling with the disappointment, with the grief. Could see the joy leave his eyes and and the deep breath he’d take, steeling himself for the rest. He would try to comfort her no matter what. He’d break himself trying to make her believe that it wasn’t her fault, that it meant nothing. Even if he finally believed her that she was cursed. She didn’t want to watch him let go of that dream like he was forced to let go of so much. She didn’t want to be the reason he had to give up. And there was a voice in her head, in her heart, telling her that she was a fool to believe in any of it. When the tears came they were hot, fast and silent. Eventually she stood and walked closer to the window, watching the courtyard keeping her hand against the fragile life growing inside her. She saw her fiery children wheeling overhead, their fierce cries echoing over the keep. Winterfell was not Dragonstone, but despite its climate and the austerity of the surrounding landscape, it had offered her the warmth her ancestral home lacked. There was life here. Around her and now inside her. The people in the North were survivors, through thick and thin, famine and feast. They persevered and they remembered.  
Now that the Battle for the Dawn was over, the battle for Westeros was beginning. Even with the North on her side finally and her armies and her dragons nothing was certain. Cersei Lannister, from all accounts, was isolated but volatile, with a limitless capacity for cruelty, barbarism and ruthlessness. She would not hesitate to use any means to destroy her enemies, real or imagined. Indeed, a woman capable of blowing up half a city to ensure her freedom wouldn’t think twice about blowing up the other half to ensure that no one would have her capital if she could not. Tyrion still believed that there was a way to take the city without killing Cersei, without bloodshed. Or rather he needed to believe it. But Dany knew better. The clean war was over, the coming war would test them all. And somehow she had to hope that she could defy the fates to bring this child into the world safely.  
She didn’t hear the door to her chamber open and close, or the footsteps that followed, but when two solid arms surrounded her, pulling her firmly against a compact chest she couldn’t help the sigh that escaped her. Already his scent was all around her, snow and leather. Fresh air. She could already feel the tears receding, and her body relaxing. Gods, this was what she’d kill and bleed for; a lifetime of this.  
“How are you today my love?” he murmured. He always spoke softly when they were alone, that rumbling voice as gentle as the touch of his calloused fingers on her skin.  
“I am well enough.” She replied carefully.  
“After the Maester left, you stayed here a long time.” He pressed his nose against her neck, breathing her in.  
“So you came to investigate?” She couldn’t stop the smile that grew on her face. How typical of him. How silly of her to imagine he hadn’t noticed.  
“I’m a worrier. You knew that beforehand.” His voice is amused now.  
“What an old woman I’ve fallen in love with.”  
He laughed softly and tightened his hold, pressing his cold nose to the sensitive skin behind her ear, making her shiver in protest. “So all is well?”  
She took a deep breath as her heart began to race all over again, “I believe so,” Then she took hold of the hand on her waist and moved it down to press low on her stomach. “I hope so.”  
“You are certain?” his voice is tense now, and his hand flexes under hers, as if to catch the life inside her in his palm.  
“The Maester is certain, and I am half terror half hope.” Her laugh is weak and choked with tears.  
“We must be careful then, in the months to come.”  
“Yes. And tell only Tyrion. And perhaps your sisters. We cannot announce this and be wrong.” Her throat is tightening again and she knows that she is about to cry again.  
“Agreed. But if it is true,”  
She can hear the rising excitement in his voice and her breath hitches in her chest as the panic sets in. A thousand fears racing around her head. “Please, Jon I cannot bear it.”  
He is silent but he pulls her even closer, keeping all their desperate hopes trapped under their joined hands.

Five months later, during a gentle snow fall, the first children of the united Stark/ Targaryen dynasty are born at Kingslanding. When Lyanna Targaryen and Aemon Stark are placed in their mother’s arms her sobs of joy, gratitude and relief are nearly cause for concern. The midwife and courtiers are looking at her as if she is unhinged. Tyrion is terrified, he can see the fear in the dwarf’s eyes. Targaryen’s go mad. It is the abiding truth of their shared house. And this Targaryen, although she has shown no signs of it, is just as susceptible.  
Only the father of these miracle children, with his silent tears and his blinding smile understands what these miracle children truly mean. Only he understands the terrible fear that their parents struggled with every day until the moment of their delivery. So he kneels on the platform beside the bed, gazes at them and their almost hysterical mother, and doesn’t try to take them in his arms or stem her tears. He wants her to have as much time with them as she can before the Maester has to take them away to clean them and check their health.  
After she’d fed them, when she allows herself to sleep, he will hold his children, stare into their precious faces and count their fingers and toes, every hair on their dear heads, memorize every expression and the sound of their breaths. These treasures are the culmination of every prayer she’d held in her heart and every hope he’s had for her. This silver haired little girl and her black haired twin brother looks like every quiet dream he’s had in his heart ever since that night on the boat.


End file.
